The cultivation of mindfulness requires periods of focused attention. Many proponents of mindfulness maintain that this is best developed through seated, silent meditation. So before considering how to focus attention, we must first consider our relationship with silence.

Whether in the center of a city or deep in a forest, the cacophony of sounds around us makes it apparent that true silence is impossible. Composer John Cage wrote music that included long periods of silence. When the musicians stopped playing, concertgoers were quickly confronted with the shuffling, shifting, and coughing sounds in the concert hall.

So what is silence?

Anyone can understand why school authorities would be jumpy, after the recent mass shooting at Newtown, CT.

But the recent suspension — and possible expulsion — of San Francisco high school student, Courtni Webb, is a fine example of how not to deal with suspected school violence.

Ms. Webb was suspended, according to news reports, for writing a poem about the Newtown killings, which apparently violated the school’s policy against threats of violence.

Poets, of course, have been deemed a threat to society ever since Plato banned them from his ideal “Republic.” Poetry, Plato argued, spoke to the heart, not the mind — and thus encouraged rebellion against the natural order of things.

But having heard Ms. Webb read her poem in its entirety, I found little in the way of violent rebellion, and certainly no overt threats to her classmates. Yes, the poem might be called self-absorbed — but isn’t that part of normal adolescence?

This is a true story.

Imagine that you are at a Wal-Mart around midnight. Dark parking lot. Little security and yet a number of random people wandering around. A man with a little boy thrown over his shoulder passes you. The little boy is screaming and kicking and crying and yelling for his mama.

The man slaps and spanks the boy and is telling him to shut up. He never uses the boy’s name. There is no woman near them and the man is moving faster. Also, imagine the boy is blond and the man has dark hair. Onlookers shake their heads but do nothing.

What would you do? Would you watch and not do anything? Or would you intervene? Social psychologists tell us there is a very good likelihood we will do nothing.

But this is the story of a woman, Pam, who did.

“ADHD medications turn kids into compliant zombies.”

“They change kids’ personalities.”

These are just some of the many myths about treating attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) with medication. And these misconceptions no doubt leave parents confused and overwhelmed about the best ways to treat their child’s disorder.

“Medications aren’t a cure-all but they can be very helpful,” according to Mark Bertin, MD, a board-certified developmental behavioral pediatrician and author of The Family ADHD Solution.

When my first daughter was born — nearly 15 years ago — I remember a level of anxiety that I carried with me wherever I was and whatever I was doing.

Was I doing things right? Would my decisions as a parent serve her well? Would she grow up to be a well-adjusted person, at ease and self-confident?

Being in the mental health field, these things were of primary importance to me. I would often ask myselff: Was I stimulating her enough? Was I providing her with an optimal amount of external stimuli? Was I stimulating her too much, interfering with her ability to soothe herself?

The answers from developmental and parenting experts were contradictory and confusing. They ranged from advice, such as never to put your baby in a crib (the equivalent of being “put behind bars”), to the need to teach your baby to self-soothe by several months of age. (Otherwise she will have difficulty developing a sense of independence and self-reliance.)

I was, as many new mothers are, vulnerable to the “shoulds” and “shouldn’ts” that were expressed all around me, both from experts and from other new mothers.

It’s only in recent years that ADHD is becoming better understood in girls and women. But we still have a long way to go, according to Terry Matlen, ACSW, a psychotherapist and coach who specializes in ADHD. She noted that we need to improve how we identify girls with ADHD, evaluate them and administer treatment.

In fact, the biggest myth about ADHD and girls is that girls don’t have the disorder in the first place. However, ADHD affects both girls and boys at roughly the same rate, said Stephanie Sarkis, Ph.D, a psychotherapist and author of several books on ADHD, including Making the Grade with ADD and Adult ADD: A Guide for the Newly Diagnosed.

Boys with ADHD tend to have a more obvious and classic presentation. They typically exhibit hyperactivity and impulsivity. In short, they stand out more.

Girls, however, are harder to spot because they internalize their symptoms and usually don’t exhibit behavioral problems at school, said Matlen, also author of Survival Tips for Women with AD/HD.

How are we expected to move on with our lives, with holiday shopping, meal planning, cookie baking and parties after what happened in Newtown, Conn. on Dec. 14, 2012?

On the day of the shooting I went to two holiday parties where everyone carefully avoided talking about what happened just hours earlier. It was weird and a relief at the same time.

Someone wrote that even those of us far away from the incident still may need to go through the five stages of grief as described by Dr. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross.

The day it happened, as we discovered the horror, many of us clung to the denial and bargaining phases. We did not want to believe we were all so vulnerable and made up reasons to avoid going there. Some just went straight to anger, even depression. None of us was ready for acceptance.

It is increasingly apparent that the Sandy Hook Elementary School tragedy has ripped open a deep wound in the American heart — particularly for parents of kids with mental health challenges.

Unlike the aftermath of other, similar tragedies, it seems that no amount of conversation, in person or online, helps ease the pain we’re feeling about the events in Newtown, Conn. on Dec. 14, 2012.

No doubt part of our shock and sorrow has to do with the ages of those gunned down, and the accumulated trauma from the sheer number of previous school shootings. But I believe there’s much more going on here. The children who died as a result of Adam Lanza’s bullets and his apparent mental illness may not have been our own flesh and blood, but the agony of saying goodbye to them has become a shared experience filled with equal parts grief and survivors’ guilt.

“I hate you people for leaving me out of so many fun things.”

Those words were not written by Adam Lanza, but another school shooter, Eric Harris, whose life was also wrought with themes of alienation and social awkwardness. Eric Harris, a Columbine shooter, compiled journal entries that pulsate with narcissistic rage and reveal a tendency to rely upon the psychological strategy of splitting: separating the world into black or white, weak or strong, good or bad, me or them.

Splitting can be seen in certain personality disorders and might also be used by some to justify bullying someone, starting a militia or cult, deciding to home-school a child, maintaining a survivalist mentality or even getting a divorce. Extreme cases of splitting can even contribute to rationalizing suicide or murder.

Want to feel better about your body?  Stop reading fashion magazines.

It’s the holidays.  Magazines focus on our waistlines and ways to survive the season while keeping a slender figure. I’m all for good health, but we’re frequently sold an image, product or diet that does not always result in good mental or physical health, particularly for women.

What’s your ideal weight?  In one alarming study, adolescent girls described their ideal girl as 5 feet 7 inches tall and weighing a mere 100 pounds.

This ideal is — at best — unhealthy and, for many, anorexic. 

In rearing my kids I always told them that ‘hate’ is a strong word. Don’t use it lightly, I advised. Don’t say, “I hate this tuna casserole!” Instead say, “Gee Mom, I strongly dislike this tuna casserole. Could I have a hot dog?” Save ‘hate’ for when ‘hate’ is the only word that can describe how you feel, when it counts.

I hate so much of what has happened recently.

I hate the senseless loss of the innocents. I hate the loss of good people who cared for the innocents.

From there it gets a little murky.

I hate that I have to separate myself from this tragedy in order to survive it. This is happening to them, not to me. I am safe, my children are safe.

Isn’t anywhere safe anymore?

You can send your kids off to the movies — and they may get shot. Or they might go to hang out at the mall — and risk getting shot. Or to high school or college — where they might get shot. Kids get kidnapped on their way home from school and abducted out of their beds.

Now 20 first graders have been gunned down in their first grade classrooms.

In the last few years, our national sense of safety has been repeatedly shaken. We can’t take it for granted that when innocent kids do innocent, everyday things, they will risk nothing more than a belly ache from eating too much popcorn or an argument with a friend.